Father's Day, contrary to popular misconception, was not established as a holiday in order to help greeting card manufacturers sell more cards. In fact when a "father's day" was first proposed there were no Father's Day cards!

Father's Day began in the United States, but no one knows quite where and when. Some say that a Mrs. John Dowd of West Virginia began Father's Day to honor her own father, who raised his family after his wife died. 

Others say it was launched in Spokane, Washington, in June 1910 by a Mrs. John Bruce Dodd (Sonora). Mrs. Dodd wanted a special day to honor her father, William Smart. William Smart, a Civil War veteran, was widowed when his wife died in childbirth with their sixth child. 

Mr. Smart was left to raise the newborn and his other five children by himself. It was after Mrs. Dodd became an adult that she realized the strength and selflessness her father had shown in raising his children as a single parent.

Sonora wanted her father to know how special he was to her. It was her father that made all the parental sacrifices and was, in the eyes of his daughter, a courageous, selfless, and loving man. 

The excert below is from the Silver Anniversary Book on Father's day published in 1935. 

"This year, 1935, the Silver Anniversary of Fathers' Day is being observed. Thirty-seven years ago, in the Big Bend hills of Washington, the day had its nativity in a lonely farm dwelling. There Sorrow ministered amid the moaning of the March winds.

A father sat with bowed head in his aloneness. About him clung his weeping children. The winds outside threw great scarfs of powdered snow against the window panes, when suddenly the last born tore himself from the group and rushed out into the storm calling for his mother. Yet even his baby voice could not penetrate the great silence that held this mother.

Hurriedly, the father gathered him back to his protection and for more than two decades, William Jackson Smart, alone, kept paternal vigilance over his motherless children.

This poignant experience in the life of Mrs. John Bruce Dodd of Spokane, Washington, who was then Sonora Louise Smart, was the inspiration for Fathers' Day which materialized through the devotion of this father and the father of her own son, John Bruce Jr., born in 1909. Through the observance of the love and the sacrifice of fathers about her everywhere, her idea of Fathers' Day crystallized in 1910, through a formal Fathers' Day petition asking recognition of fatherhood."

Sonora's father was born in June, so she chose to hold the first Father's Day celebration in Spokane, Washington on the 19th of June, 1910.

At about the same time in various towns and cities across American other people were beginning to celebrate a "father's day." In 1924 President Calvin Coolidge supported the idea of a national Father's Day.

In 1926, a National Father's Day Committee was formed in New York City.

In 1956, Father's Day was recognized by a Joint Resolution of Congress.

In 1966, President Lyndon Johnson signed a presidential proclamation declaring the 3rd Sunday of June as Father's Day. 

In 1972, President Richard Nixon established a permanent national observance of Father's Day to be held on the third Sunday of June.

So Father's Day was born in memory and gratitude by a daughter who thought that her father and all good fathers should be honored with a special day just like we honor our mothers on Mother's Day.

Father's Day is a day of commemoration and celebration of Dad. It is a day to not only honor your father, but all men who have acted as a father figure in your life - whether as Stepfathers, Uncles, Grandfathers, or "Big Brothers."

It is a time of burnt toast and breakfast in bed, family gatherings, crayon scribbled "I Love You"s and, of course, that lovely new tie!


Many Catholics call St. Joseph's Day, on March 19, Father's Day, because Joseph was the father of Jesus. But most people celebrate a more modern version of Father's Day.

Roses are the Father's Day flowers: red to be worn for a living father and white if the father has died.

What Makes A Dad
~ Author is unknown ~

God took the strength of a mountain,
The majesty of a tree,
The warmth of a summer sun,
The calm of a quiet sea,
The generous soul of nature,
The comforting arm of night,
The wisdom of the ages,
The power of the eagle's flight,
The joy of a morning in spring,
The faith of a mustard seed,
The patience of eternity,
The depth of a family need,
Then God combined these qualities,
When there was nothing more to add,
He knew His masterpiece was complete,
And so, He called it ... Dad

A Father and a Dad Are Not the Same  

A father and a dad are not the same:
One can be a dad and not a father,
Or one can be a father and not bother
To earn through love the more endearing name.

Some find fatherhood a bit too tame,
Leaving all the details to the mother,
Or dumping the sweet burden on another
Man with just a passing twinge of shame.

You have been our dad so many years
That you've become the landscape that is home,
The mountain that we look to from afar.
No matter where we go we're not alone,
For you remain within to still our fears
And be the word that tells us who we are.

A Little Girl Needs Daddy 

A little girl needs Daddy
For many, many things:
Like holding her high off the ground
Where the sunlight sings! 
Like being the deep music
That tells her all is right
When she awakens frantic with
The terrors of the night. 

Like being the great mountain
That rises in her heart
And shows her how she might get home
When all else falls apart. 

Like giving her the love
That is her sea and air,
So diving deep or soaring high
She'll always find him there.

The Things You Taught Me I Will Always Know  

The things you taught me I will always know.
How could I not? The roots have sunk so deep:
All lessons of the heart that I will keep
No matter who I am or where I go.

Kids learn from what their parents are, and so
You are my book of life, the thoughts I reap;
Only in your arms I quiet sleep;
Under my words your voice sings soft and slow.

From you I learned the rules of right and wrong
Against which I at times had to rebel,
Though with regret I carry with me still.
How lucky I am to have been loved so well,
Even as I pushed against your will,
Relying on a father fair and strong. 

To Be a Good Father, What Must One Do? 

To be a good father, what must one do?
First one must love, as the sun warms the Earth,
Nourishing those to whom it gave birth
With radiant pleasure and joy ever new. 

And what then, my father, must a good father do?
Then one must give of oneself, as a rill
Flings itself carelessly down a steep hill
To fill up a hollow with heaven's sweet hue. 

What next, my father, must a good father do?
Next one must gird up one's loins to protect
Those who might suffer from want and neglect
Were one not loyal, and to one's vow true. 

Is there anything else a good father must do?
Yes, there is much more that cannot be said,
Addressed to the heart and not to the head
And oh!, my dear father, that one is you!

You've Been Everything to Me 
~ Unknown ~

You've been everything to me: a father,
Teacher, playmate, model, conscience, friend.
Sometimes I'm not certain why you bother,
If your feelings on my words depend.
I know I haven't been the child I should:
Far from it, and I really can't say why.
I know exactly what I'd label good,
But in the real world something goes awry.
Underneath my actions there is love,
Gratitude, respect, and admiration.
Sometimes I don't know what I'm thinking of,
But I thank God you're in for the duration.
I'm sorry, sorry for the things I do,
But please believe I cherish Mom and you.

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